Humanoid infantry robots become available (RAR!)

[Zor]

Eh, good enough. Step one: send B-52 overhead with one leaflet per citizen (better yet, three or four!) saying "Danger: do not carry a gun around our robot minions. They kill people who carry guns." Then send in the robots.

Good, the terrorists now carry knives/crowbars and disable all of your bots before taking their (likely much nicer) guns.

[
The Robots can identify someone running towards them with a crowbar as being a threat, leaving aside that even if you got close to them going up against an armored humanoid machine with a knife is not going to be an easy feat.

Zor

[Tribble]

I say we buy up 100% of production for a few years, then use them to conquer Canada and take over the manufacturing process.

As I stated earlier, a far more likely scenario will be that the USA immediately exert pressure to seize total control of the Canadian assets. The USA will not want Canada to be the sole provider of that level of military technology. Nor would it want Canada producing that technology, period. It's in America's best interests to take total control as quickly as possible.

An American company would probably just offer buy the designs, patents and the factory. And after that's done, the company would ship them to a secure American location. I doubt the Canadian government would object because it would realise very quickly that if it didn't comply the Americans would take the gloves off and force them to give the tech over anyways, so they may as well make some kind of profit while they can.

[Zor]

I say we buy up 100% of production for a few years, then use them to conquer Canada and take over the manufacturing process.

As I stated earlier, a far more likely scenario will be that the USA immediately exert pressure to seize total control of the Canadian assets. The USA will not want Canada to be the sole provider of that level of military technology. Nor would it want Canada producing that technology, period. It's in America's best interests to take total control as quickly as possible.

An American company would probably just offer buy the designs, patents and the factory. And after that's done, the company would ship them to a secure American location. I doubt the Canadian government would object because it would realise very quickly that if it didn't comply the Americans would take the gloves off and force them to give the tech over anyways, so they may as well make some kind of profit while they can.

You do realize that America does buy a lot of foreign machinery for it's military as is? Even high end things like the F-22 use a lot of components made outside the States.

Zor

[Skywalker_T-65]

There is a bit of difference between 'fighter jet components' and 'killbots' though.

[Enigma]

If I was the Canadian Prime Roast... errr Minister, I'd have the government secretly purchase the facility, pretend to shut it down but really relocate it to a secret location and crank out the bots at full capacity until we have the infrastructure in place to deploy them, *then* make deals with Britain and the U.S..

[Tribble]

If I was the Canadian Prime Roast... errr Minister, I'd have the government secretly purchase the facility, pretend to shut it down but really relocate it to a secret location and crank out the bots at full capacity until we have the infrastructure in place to deploy them, *then* make deals with Britain and the U.S..

Can we just say that the robots were invented the USA? The odds are practically zero that Canada would develop military robots on their own, and even if they did there is virtually zero chance that they would hold onto the monopoly long enough to matter. Any country that bought robots from Canada would promptly reverse-engineer them, and what is Canada going to do to stop them? Complain to the UN? Nobody takes Canada's military seriously, even most Canadians don't, and I highly doubt any country would respect any design patents. Hell, as a NATO member Canada should be obligated to hand over the designs to at least the USA, if not other members. The only reason Canadians get to live they way they do with the small military that they have is because of US protection. As their defenders, the Americans should have the right to use and develop that tech fully without Canadian interference.

[Sea Skimmer]

Sure although at this level of intelligence, civillian vs terrorist discrimination is not going to be any more sophisticated than 'is holding a gun'.

Doing that with high reliability would be more then good enough with squad level human controllers, and better then humans infantry under fire overall. Ambushed troops have been known to specifically aim at and kill livestock simply because they recognize the animal as living and moving, but not what it is or what it is doing.

As it is if you can recognize a firearm, you can almost by default recognize what direction its pointing too. If it isn't pointing at the robot then that's a time when a preset can cause it to call for human intervention, as opposed to opening fire instantly. And that's technology which is already being field trialed for fixed surveillance cameras in Afghanistan, though the main focus has been on identifying the RPG-7.

[Zor]

Can we just say that the robots were invented the USA?

No.

The odds are practically zero that Canada would develop military robots on their own, and even if they did there is virtually zero chance that they would hold onto the monopoly long enough to matter. Any country that bought robots from Canada would promptly reverse-engineer them, and what is Canada going to do to stop them? Complain to the UN? Nobody takes Canada's military seriously, even most Canadians don't, and I highly doubt any country would respect any design patents

The fact of the matter that reverse engineering has its distinct limits and still has to go through prototyping, testing and setting up production Infrastructure. All of which takes time and money. Or they could buy Robots from Canada and eventually come to arrangement to make some of them in the states on license and not cause an incident which would adversely effect foreign relations?

Hell, as a NATO member Canada should be obligated to hand over the designs to at least the USA, if not other members. The only reason Canadians get to live they way they do with the small military that they have is because of US protection. As their defenders, the Americans should have the right to use and develop that tech fully without Canadian interference.

Well cry me a butthurt nationalist river. Even in a hypothetical scenario built around robotics that are decades more advanced than anything we got today becoming available overnight the thought of them being Canadian breaks your suspension of disbelief?

Zor

[paladin]

I, for one, would welcome our new Canadian overlords!!

[Simon_Jester]

Eh, good enough. Step one: send B-52 overhead with one leaflet per citizen (better yet, three or four!) saying "Danger: do not carry a gun around our robot minions. They kill people who carry guns." Then send in the robots.

Good, the terrorists now carry knives/crowbars and disable all of your bots before taking their (likely much nicer) guns.

Oh come on, you know it's not going to be that comically simple. These robots wouldn't be worth spit if they couldn't identify someone or something directly attacking them with a melee weapon.

Or, hell, "shoot anyone with a gun, taze anyone within ten feet." At least, that's what they do in combat mode, and it's a human teleoperator's responsibility to monitor them and switch to that mode if need be.

One issue that isn't coming up her that came up in the power armor thread is how well these bots will hold up with a 48 hour engagement window? It's much less of an issue, as the bots loosing power in the field don't matter as much as people in suits, but will they be able to perform?

One of the main reasons they won't replace combat infantry entirely. One question: can they carry spare batteries, can they perform battery swaps on each other?

I say we buy up 100% of production for a few years, then use them to conquer Canada and take over the manufacturing process.

As I stated earlier, a far more likely scenario will be that the USA immediately exert pressure to seize total control of the Canadian assets. The USA will not want Canada to be the sole provider of that level of military technology. Nor would it want Canada producing that technology, period. It's in America's best interests to take total control as quickly as possible.

An American company would probably just offer buy the designs, patents and the factory. And after that's done, the company would ship them to a secure American location. I doubt the Canadian government would object because it would realise very quickly that if it didn't comply the Americans would take the gloves off and force them to give the tech over anyways, so they may as well make some kind of profit while they can.

I'm a little skeptical about this. It's not like the robots make other armies much more of a threat to the US (because they'd be easily disabled by antitank weapons, heavy machine guns, armored vehicles, and so on; the Terminator they ain't). And Canada is in fact an allied country with considerable and longstanding economic ties to the US. I think it far more likely that, given the very reasonable per-unit price the Canadians would be charging, the US would rather just buy the damn things in large quantity rather than risk a huge legal scuffle with Canada that the US would likely lose.

Remember that America isn't Nazi Germany; it has a real court system, the rule of law is a real thing. Certainly in the context of corporate law, international business, and dealing with closely allied nations.

[Batman]

Don't be ridiculous, The US always and ever exerts massive economical and political pressure to acquire and make sure it's the only one that has foreign-developed military technology and totally never said 'Um-we would like to license that?'
Not that I see Tribble's idiotic scenario coming to pass even if Canada refuses to license production for the reasons S_J pointed out.

[Simon_Jester]

Don't be ridiculous, The US always and ever exerts massive economical and political pressure to acquire and make sure it's the only one that has foreign-developed military technology and totally never said 'Um-we would like to license that?'

While I do believe I know the facts, at this point I'm having trouble being sure whether you mean this literally or sarcastically. Sorry, would you mind clearing that up?

Not that I see Tribble's idiotic scenario coming to pass even if Canada refuses to license production for the reasons S_J pointed out.

Yeah. Also, I think he's really playing up the "CANADA WEAK MURCA STRONG MURCA TAKE WHAT MURCA WANT" angle too much. While the US has a thuggish reputation in the eyes of many posters here, frankly no really large organization (like the US military-industrial complex) can operate unless it's willing to obey the rule of law with respect to its own suppliers and allies.

[Enigma]

While I said if I was Prime Minister, what I would do with the factory, in reality, I do believe the government would try to buy them outright in interest of national security and then make the bots for themselves and sell to their allies, primarily the U.S. and Britain, possibly the E.U. too unless the U.S. puts up too much of a fuss. If the Canadian government instead could opt to be factory's exclusive distributor of the bots, regulating as to who gets to buy them. They don't need to make them, but still make money and choose who gets to buy the bots.

[Starglider]

One of the main reasons they won't replace combat infantry entirely. One question: can they carry spare batteries, can they perform battery swaps on each other?

Most likely, but I think it's a non-issue anyway. In the short term it just means deploying more gen-sets. In the medium term, most combat vehicles are going to diesel-electric series hybrid anyway, a process that would only be accelerated by this development. So pretty much any APC / IFV / truck / HMMWV would be able to recharge them anyway.

[Batman]

Don't be ridiculous, The US always and ever exerts massive economical and political pressure to acquire and make sure it's the only one that has foreign-developed military technology and totally never said 'Um-we would like to license that?'

While I do believe I know the facts, at this point I'm having trouble being sure whether you mean this literally or sarcastically. Sorry, would you mind clearing that up?

Definitely sarcasm, sorry about that. While the US (just as any other country) most certainly uses its influence to get favourable licensing conditions for stuff other people came up with I don't recall them flat out trying to take away those people's ability to continue building it too. Afterall, Europe still has military industry despite the US license-building our stuff.
Would the US put some pressure on Canada to be allowed to license-build the robots? Very likely. Tribble's scenario? I don't think so.

[Enigma]

I agree. There would be lots of deal making between Canada and the U.S. with both hopefully getting what they want.

[Zor]

One of the main reasons they won't replace combat infantry entirely. One question: can they carry spare batteries, can they perform battery swaps on each other?

Yes, each battery weighs in at about twenty kilograms and can be swapped out. They also have a 10 minute emergency battery and they can plug into external power sources to top themselves off.

Zor

[Simon_Jester]

Can they get a useful charge off of a wall socket? What's their actual power drain?

[Starglider]

Can they get a useful charge off of a wall socket? What's their actual power drain?

A contemporary lithium-ion battery weighing 20kg would be about 10 kWh. There is no way that would be enough for 48 hours of 'continuous activity' for a robot this large. Presumably the battery is a near-future technology such as lithium-air, which would be more like 100 kWh, supporting a 2 kW average power draw, which is reasonable for an armoured robot marching around and swinging a rifle. At that rate recharge from a wall socket would be at a similar rate to the drain from activity e.g. sit recharging for one hour to power one hour of combat (exact ratio depending on the domestic electrical specs for the local country, the full cycle efficiency of the batteries, how fast the robots move and how much power the electronics draw).

[Zaune]

For purposes of comparison, how much does it actually cost to put a 16 year-old high school dropout through basic infantry training?

[Mr Bean]

For purposes of comparison, how much does it actually cost to put a 16 year-old high school dropout through basic infantry training?

The number a quick google search shows up is 70,000$ not counting recruiting costs from the day they ship out to MEPS to bootcamp to final review to arrival at their first duty station for a base line grunt not counting the salary you pay the grunt. Send him to a combat zone and if he survives for a year your already past 200k with salary and transport/training costs.

[Simon_Jester]

Can they get a useful charge off of a wall socket? What's their actual power drain?

A contemporary lithium-ion battery weighing 20kg would be about 10 kWh. There is no way that would be enough for 48 hours of 'continuous activity' for a robot this large. Presumably the battery is a near-future technology such as lithium-air, which would be more like 100 kWh, supporting a 2 kW average power draw, which is reasonable for an armoured robot marching around and swinging a rifle. At that rate recharge from a wall socket would be at a similar rate to the drain from activity e.g. sit recharging for one hour to power one hour of combat (exact ratio depending on the domestic electrical specs for the local country, the full cycle efficiency of the batteries, how fast the robots move and how much power the electronics draw).

Amusingly, this means that most of the old rules of thumb for how long soldiers need to sleep, and how to have men on watch, also roughly apply to the robots... assuming you can find enough wall sockets for them to 'sleep' by.

For purposes of comparison, how much does it actually cost to put a 16 year-old high school dropout through basic infantry training?

The number a quick google search shows up is 70,000$ not counting recruiting costs from the day they ship out to MEPS to bootcamp to final review to arrival at their first duty station for a base line grunt not counting the salary you pay the grunt. Send him to a combat zone and if he survives for a year your already past 200k with salary and transport/training costs.

Some of that cost also applies to the robots, but it's an issue.

One point to make is that modern basic infantry training is more demanding than its World War-era counterpart. Soldiers use more equipment and have to maintain it better for it to work correctly. We expect high standards of discipline from the troops, which requires lots of well-trained officers and noncoms to keep an eye on them. And everyone even peripherally involved in the logistical process of getting that soldier trained and ready to fight has to be paid at modern First World salaries.

Thus, you run into the problem of Arithmetic on the Frontier

[InsaneTD]

I think most armies would quickly design a transportable charging station, with built in generator. Probably built into a 40 foot shopping container for ease of transport. And also have it capable of plugging into the local grid if it can support it. One container could probably hold 10 charging stations and a minor maintenance station with the genset.

[Zaune]

So they're at best marginally more expendable -and let's face it, this is a desirable trait in light infantry- and they can't operate effectively under EMCON -or if the control room gets clobbered by enemy artillery- unless there's a live human within shouting distance at all times.

I'm not sure what problem these things actually solve, except possibly for special cases like Japan.

[Starglider]

So they're at best marginally more expendable

Sure, if you live in Stalinist Russia where casualties mean absolutely nothing other than the monetary cost of replacement.

and they can't operate effectively under EMCON -or if the control room gets clobbered by enemy artillery- unless there's a live human within shouting distance at all times.

Laser line-of-sight data-links would be relatively cheap to integrate. I don't know how much EMCON is actually an issue for current US Army infantry operations, but if it is a problem laser and/or tightbeam microwave links are the answer (obviously a huge improvement on humans using hand signals). Laser / tight beam links can of course be relayed via UAVs as well.

Amusingly, this means that most of the old rules of thumb for how long soldiers need to sleep, and how to have men on watch, also roughly apply to the robots... assuming you can find enough wall sockets for them to 'sleep' by.

Being 'on watch' will use minimal power. Although you wouldn't normally use infantry robots for that, you'd use grid-connected micro-UAVs, micro scout crawlers and static expendable cameras. Intelligent use of this technology would apply this to live fire combat as well; effectively AI network co-ordinated micro scale combined arms warfare.